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Arizona Adventures

Friday, February 24, 2012

A few weekends ago we hopped in the car and drove to sunny Arizona. It was a very welcome get-away. Our main purpose in going was to spend a few days with our good friends from Texas, Morgan and Karen and their cute little 1-year-old Carter. Karen threw the cutest little birthday party. We sure do wish we lived closer, but I'm so glad we are close enough to see each other a few times a year. Other highlights of our weekend include:

Riding beach cruisers on a perfect Arizona evening

Russ seeing the Hoover Dam for the first time -- and loving it

Eating an orange straight from a tree!

Playing Buck Hunter with Morgan and Karen. Brought back old times.

Scoping out the highly anticipated store, Last Chance, and all of it's crazy glory. I have to admit, I was slightly disappointed.

Hitting the craziest snow storm EVER on our way home. Russ's Prizm is a champ.

Last, but definitely not least, sneaking into the Grand Canyon.

...

Ok, let me explain real quick.

I have never seen the Grand Canyon. I feel like living within driving distance doesn't give me much of an excuse to have never seen one of the 7 natural wonders of the world! So on our way home we planned to drive through. As we are getting closer it is literally SNOWING. Are you for real?!? When we get to the pay station the lady tells us it is $25, even just to drive through. As we see the sign that says "poor visibility," we decide to save the cash and come back another time.

And then we realize in order to get to the highway we have to drive through the Grand Canyon, that is if we didn't want to backtrack a few hours. Dang. We decide to ask a Park Ranger if there is any other way that will get us back to the highway besides going south again. After Russ smooth-talked him for 5 or 10 minutes, our most favoritest (yes, that's a word) Park Ranger then proceeds to say "Well, technically you don't HAVE to pay to get in the Grand Canyon. They don't want me to tell people about it, but I figure you guys are just driving through anyway." After telling us the side road that sneaks us in, we go on our merry, happy way. After a 20 or so minute off-roading experience in Russ's prizm (note to self -- we need a bigger car), we pull into the back of the Grand Canyon. Miraculously it had even stopped snowing and the fog had cleared. I'm so glad it all worked out. That sure was a GRAND canyon! :)